My Name Is Fang Xian. Come Find Me If You Dare

Night at Changzhao Reservoir was dark and deep.

Zhu Shuang knew this place was especially likely to breed urban legends.

"What's going on? It won't turn off!"

"What kind of crappy phone is this? Crappy, crappy phone!"

Zhu Shuang's face twisted further.

He held the phone in his small hands and snarled.

If it weren't for that Fang Xian...

He...

He could have...

[Are you there?]

[Are you there?]

[Are you there?]

Text messages flooded Zhu Shuang's phone as though they cost nothing.

Their tone grew impatient.

Then they became:

[Are you there!]

[Are you there!!!]

[Are you there!!!!]

As if someone were screaming.

At the same time, his phone wallpaper seemed to ripple.

It had been a selfie of Zhu Shuang holding an insect net.

Now the screen seemed frozen, with strange patches of pixelation across it.

"A ten-thousand-yuan phone! What a piece of junk!"

Zhu Shuang was furious. He pressed the power button as hard as he could.

No matter what he did, it would not turn off.

Gradually, his expression changed.

His wallpaper was changing.

Little by little, it seemed to become someone else.

A black-and-white photograph.

Like...

The kind taken after someone died.

A memorial portrait.

Pitch-black eyes stared out from a lifeless face, fixed on the child beyond the screen.

It kept staring as livid patches spread across the face.

"Wh-what..."

Zhu Shuang stumbled and fell.

A cold wind swept past. His face went deathly pale, and sweat soaked his back.

Didn't he know the man in that portrait?

Wasn't this...

The guy he had tricked into the water to feed the fish?

Why...

Why was he here?!

Zhu Shuang jerked his head up and looked around.

"An urban legend!"

"It's an urban legend!"

"It has to be!"

He looked around frantically.

But he saw nothing.

The wilderness was already dark, and the stench in the air grew stronger.

"No way!"

"The Pest Spray I used hasn't worn off yet!"

"A wild urban legend shouldn't come after me!"

Zhu Shuang wanted to leave, but he could not bear to abandon his ten-thousand-yuan phone.

He had spent three months' allowance on it.

Gritting his teeth, he picked it up off the ground.

It was fine.

Everything was fine.

Zhu Shuang met the eyes of the man in the portrait.

They were chillingly cold.

Like a rotting corpse rising from the depths of an icy pool.

His mouth seemed to open and close.

As though he were saying something.

His voice was faint.

Zhu Shuang could not make it out.

Summoning his courage, Zhu Shuang put the phone to his ear, trying to hear what the man was saying.

His ear drew closer.

The voice grew...

Suddenly louder!

The phone answered the call by itself.

A man's voice came through—one that would haunt Zhu Shuang's dreams.

"Zhu Shuang of Class One, Grade Five, First Central Primary School, Binhai District, Jiangzhou!!"

"Your mother brought you two—"

"Forget it."

"Fuck you!"

Zhu Shuang's ears nearly went deaf!

More terrifying still, chilling him to the bone, was the realization that someone had found out exactly who he was!

It was...

That monster!

The axe-wielding maniac who stayed up all night!

Zhu Shuang shuddered, flung the phone away, and bolted without any idea where he was going.

He had only one thought.

Run!!

Run!!

I ran into a monster!

I ran into a monster!!

That terrifying voice rang out behind him.

"My name is Fang Xian!"

"You'd better come find me if you've got the guts!"

"Otherwise, I'll come find you!"

"You little bastard."

Zhu Shuang was utterly numb. He fell to the ground without making a sound. All he knew was that he could not look back. If he did, he was finished.

That man...

He was an urban legend himself!

Zhu Shuang had to go! He had to get out of here, out of Jiangzhou!

"Why am I so unlucky?!"

"How did I run into a monster like that?!"

His pupils dilated. Sweat rolled down his forehead, and his expression hovered on the brink of collapse. He did not even dare pick up his baseball cap when it fell off. He just kept running.

"Huh, he doesn't want his phone?"

"Perfect. I can trade it in for a new one later. Nice."

"Kids these days sure are rich. He could afford a Star Phone."

Fang Xian looked at the feedback from the Urban Legend Compendium, then glanced at his own Peace-of-Mind Phone.

He wanted to join the Stars crowd too: use a Star Phone and live the Stars lifestyle!

His mood settled, and the smile faded from his face.

[Evil Child].

There was no doubt Zhu Shuang was an Evil Child through and through.

Malice radiated from him. The man in the No One Calling urban legend had probably died because he trusted Zhu Shuang's harmless appearance.

The scariest people in the world were not bad adults, but bad children.

Under the Great Xin Council's current laws, Zhu Shuang could not even be given an effective sentence.

Fortunately, the kid was a coward.

Fang Xian's No One Calling urban legend was frightening, but it could not actually hurt anyone. It was the same as his urban legend, The Stalker.

It could only scare people. It was terrifying, certainly, but anyone with the will to endure it would come through unharmed.

Perhaps urban legends that could directly harm humans really were rare.

"Class One, Grade Five, First Central Primary School, Binhai District."

"Zhu Shuang, who's been feeding the Human-Faced Fish."

Fang Xian knew the school. It was an elite school in the heart of the city. Most parents there were Council civil servants or middle managers at nearby corporations. That explained how the kid could afford such an expensive phone.

"Just wait. You'd better not run."

"Because I'm exactly the kind of grown-up who picks fights with kids."

With that thought, Fang Xian left the surveillance room and looked outside the guesthouse.

The sky was growing light.

Sunday had arrived.

He stretched and breathed in the fresh air.

Xiao Jiu did the same. She looked as though she had been asleep for ages.

"This No One Calling urban legend is really useful."

"But I don't know what the price is... I'll go to the hospital and get checked again."

Fang Xian was taking the matter seriously.

Of course, the most important thing was to rest properly and keep a healthy sleep schedule.

After checking on the Human-Faced Fish in the backyard pool, where it floated like a corpse, Fang Xian went back to his room to sleep.

Morning.

Yao Hui came out of the bathroom after brushing her teeth, dark circles under her eyes.

After the Paper Figure incident, she had not been able to sleep at all.

She had tossed and turned all night, then searched her phone for "strange stories from Great Xin" and "what to do if you run into a ghost."

The more she read, the more frightened she became.

The room had two beds.

But Huihuizi had ended up burrowing straight into Song Yizhou's sweet-smelling blankets.

"Zhouzhou, you're up so early?"

"Sleep a little longer. I'll bring you breakfast in a bit."

Yao Hui saw Song Yizhou sitting by the window. Instead of reading as she usually did, she seemed to be staring blankly at her phone.

"Oh, don't be scared. They were just pranks! What haven't I seen?"

In broad daylight, dear Huihuizi was no longer afraid.

Song Yizhou nodded faintly.

She looked at the chat on her phone.

[3:15 a.m.]

[Fang Xian: Are you there?]

Song Yizhou found it a little strange.

First, Fang Xian never messaged her first.

And second, hadn't he just said not to start a message with "Are you there?"

How had he ended up using it himself?

Song Yizhou was still comforting Huihuizi at the time and hadn't gone to sleep, so she replied earnestly.

[Silence Is Zhou: I'm here.]

[Silence Is Zhou: Hello, Fang Xian.]

[Silence Is Zhou: I haven't gone to sleep yet. Is there a problem with the surveillance cameras? I can come down.]

Then there was no reply.

When she woke up in the morning, she checked again.

[4:08 a.m.]

[Fang Xian: Send me a selfie. I like seeing them. Take more.]